


Such Transmutation As This

by aishitara



Category: Supernatural
Genre: 15x18 fix-it, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canonical Defeat of Chuck, Castiel POV, M/M, PBExchangeReunion, Post-Series, Post-series fix-it, Rated M for Themes, Suicidal Ideation, Suicide Attempt (sort of), Temporary Canonical MCD, emotional hurt/comfort if you squint, profoundnet, series-typical blood and injury, temporary MCD (kinda)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-14
Updated: 2021-02-14
Packaged: 2021-03-15 14:28:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,874
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29437530
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aishitara/pseuds/aishitara
Summary: He thinks about the conjugation of bodies, hands touching hands, skin to skin – the infinitesimal atomic gap that can never truly be crossed, and yet, and yet, when their hands touch, when their flesh meets, the gap is nonexistent, every piece and particle yearning for union, consuming him in a conflagration of feeling he can no longer contain. Every embrace, rare and brief and precious, devours his senses and leaves him longing, and now in this place, in this darkness, they play on repeat in his mind, and the hunger comes and comes and comes and never seems to end.It is a hunger he has come to welcome; its presence sits warm in his belly, a banked inferno, staving off the cold desolation threatening to overwhelm him.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Comments: 12
Kudos: 27
Collections: Profound Bond Gift Exchange: Reunion





	Such Transmutation As This

**Author's Note:**

  * For [SomethingBlue42](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SomethingBlue42/gifts).



> This is my contribution to the ProfoundBond Gift Exchange, round 7. The theme was "reunion" and _boy_ , did I go down into this weird thought spiral about the nature of reunion, poetry, and some Greek mythos to boot. Huge inspiration was found from [this poem,](https://www.instagram.com/p/BxC6YAhH4Xu/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link) [this poem,](https://www.instagram.com/p/BvULbIZH02-/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link) and [this poem.](https://www.instagram.com/p/BtoQDAqHxrg/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link) And oh yeah, some [Seamus Heaney](https://www.poetryireland.ie/publications/poetry-ireland-review/online-archive/view/the-underground) as well.
> 
> Many, many thanks to [LaughingStones,](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LaughingStones/profile) once again for their invaluable writing advice and all-around support. Both [K_A_Mindin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/K_A_Mindin/profile) and [snowkab](https://archiveofourown.org/users/snowkab/profile) provided a thorough beta and caught any lingering mistakes (and now, if there's anything amiss, it's my fault lol). A big big thank you also to the very generous [PallasPerilous](https://archiveofourown.org/users/PallasPerilous/profile) for giving this a once-over and soothing my fragile writer ego when I was doubtful I was going in the right direction.
> 
> And of course, to my number one cheerleader, the marvelous [conversationalpurgatory,](https://archiveofourown.org/users/conversationalpurgatory/profile) whose support and patience make it possible for me to keep doing this even when my depression desperately wants me to nope the fuck out. Big hugs, hon! 
> 
> This fic is a gift for [SomethingBlue42](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SomethingBlue42/profile) \- happy PB Gift Exchange! ::throws kiss:: I hope you enjoy!
> 
> ***to be added to Profound Bond Gift Exchange: Reunion collection***

Re·un·ion  
/rēyōōnyən/  
_noun_

  * the act or process of being brought together again as a unified whole.  
  




Love is a cruel justice,  
she makes us pay for our lover’s sins as well as our own,  
and she took away the one whose loss would hurt him deepest.  
~ “Hymn to Persephone” by Craig Arnold

He wonders: can he have reunion with what never was?

Sitting in a vast darkness, silent and still, he thinks about the nature of connection. Gossamer strings of – _something_ – weaving in and out and around and between all that is and ever was, touching hearts, the ties that bind. Particle to anti-particle, covalent, magnetic, gravitational, even. The whole of existence, cosmos and quantum alike, the fabric of all realities orbit the nexus of his understanding of himself and the love he holds in his heart of hearts.  
  
Time and distance, ebb and flow, uncoupling and coalescing. Walking upward into light, into love, damned if he looks backward, even for a moment, but shuffling along behind him the brightest light, the truest love. He knows. He knows. He _knows_ he cannot look back.

**~~~**

Expecting silence, Castiel was stunned to find the Empty thrown into outright chaos.

The cost to himself was everything, and it was nothing. Castiel spoke his deepest truth and let it set him free, greeting not his fate but the consequence of his free actions with a full heart and a visceral understanding that it would be the last time he would lay eyes on Dean. Beautiful, flawed Dean, whose heart was largely a mystery to Castiel, but which Castiel had promised himself long ago he would, regardless, protect with his dying breath.  
  
And so he had. And here he was. Alone, constrained, the glacial press of true nothingness frigid against the somehow still-substantive flesh of his vessel. The sole creature in a stygian blackness so complete, he could very well have been standing next to something or some _one_ and have no inkling of it at all.  
  
But the longer he stood in the dark, the more Castiel noticed a mellow droning that resonated in his bones before it became fully audible. Harsher than the static-feedback-crackle of his brethren in Heaven, worse even than the tormented shrieking of those souls damned to Perdition, the mingled sorrow and despair of every demon and angel ever condemned to the Empty rose around him and assaulted his senses. No single being or entity made itself known to him. Death did not follow into this place of nothingness. Yet he was simultaneously surrounded and absolutely alone, listening to the cries of the dead and thinking eventually, in its own time, the Empty would come to him. It would come, and it would make efficient use of its considerable power to make his continued existence miserable.  
  
In the meanwhile, he sat atop the tumultuous ocean of pain in this place, buoyed and clinging to the love that brought him here, and remembered: Dean knew, now. He knew he was loved, and precious, and good, and Castiel was overjoyed. He gathered his joy around him like armor against the dark, and he sat, and he waited.

**~~~  
**

He thinks about the conjugation of bodies, hands touching hands, skin to skin – the infinitesimal atomic gap that can never truly be crossed, and yet, and yet, when their hands touch, when their flesh meets, the gap is nonexistent, every piece and particle yearning for union, consuming him in a conflagration of feeling he can no longer contain. Every embrace, rare and brief and precious, devours his senses and leaves him longing, and now in this place, in this darkness, they play on repeat in his mind, and the hunger comes and comes and comes and never seems to end.

It is a hunger he has come to welcome; its presence sits warm in his belly, a banked inferno, staving off the cold desolation threatening to overwhelm him.

**~~~**

It was Castiel’s deepest wish for Dean to know how beloved he was.  
  
He’d known, oh – for a long time – how much he loved Dean, _wanted_ Dean. How Castiel’s body turned toward him heliotropically, without consideration or consent, anytime they were together. Even when they were furious with one another, they were bound; something or other always drawing them towards an inescapable reunion. A dazzling, blossoming ache always consumed Castiel when he and Dean fought, but it was an ache he’d learned to live with.  
  
An ache effortlessly soothed away under the onslaught of _not too late_ and _I should’ve stopped you_ and _of_ course _I forgive you_ , words that rang more of confession than of invocation. Parts of Castiel laying silent and martyred resurfaced in Purgatory when he heard Dean’s prayer and felt the thread of _something_ connecting their hearts give a warm, solid tug.  
  
The month between their return from Purgatory and Castiel’s final journey into the Empty was filled with moments Castiel had considered, and ultimately dismissed, as the right moment to tell Dean the truest truths in his heart. Different moments, maybe, but Castiel convinced himself there were none better than the one he finally chose; it was for himself as well as for Dean to confess as he did, to spill open like ripe fruit full of promise, secure in the knowledge that the seeds they carry will fall to fertile soil and grow. To know happiness because the one person he loved beyond reason or measure knew how dear he was, to a creature never built for loving like _this_.  
  
That Castiel would never know anything beyond the _being_ didn’t trouble him. To have been altered so fundamentally that he could now look upon himself as worthy of love and loving, too, was enough.

**~~~**

He thinks, it’s time to make friends with this dark place inside him. He is done with running around trying to save everyone and everything, letting his guard down and the darkness up to overshadow. He thinks, if he stays perfectly still, if he stops gasping for air and closes his eyes and remains unmoving, he can be a shining light, warning others away from the shades of their shame, luminescence leading them into something new.  
  
There’s nothing left for him but stillness now; he may as well make the most of it.

**~~~**

Castiel was weary from the wanting, but it didn’t stop him from picturing irises green as tumbled sea glass, or freckles scattered like stars on sun-kissed skin. It couldn’t stop him from remembering the feeling, in Hell, that the soul he had been tasked to save was the very reason for his Father’s creation, bright and strong and shining under the thick layers of angst and shame, radiating love in even the darkest of places.  
  
Underneath all of it: love, so righteous and so powerful not even God’s own ineffable plans could stop Castiel from embracing it with all that he was.

**~~~**

Time passes lazily, here, if it passes at all. Sometimes it stands still as stone, replaying a moment caught and frozen like an insect in amber, casting a light on an incident of his tripping, stumbling, falling into love, persistent and perpetual and ever-expanding, filling the space inside him until all that’s left is a covetous thirst, a desperate ache, no room for anything but the starvation of separation.  
  
He attempts to approach it with math and logic, thinks, yes, golden and spiraling and ratios and perfection, and finds himself back where he started, loving and yearning in equal measure, but maybe it is the nature of anything time-bound; always spiraling back to what is, ultimately, immutable.

**~~~**

An eddying in the shadows around his feet put Castiel on alert.

Unsure of how much time had passed since the Empty took him, he wondered if it had finally tired of letting him ruminate on his own. The relentless wall of sound didn’t abate; if anything it grew even more impossible to ignore, closing around Castiel and pressing on him like a lead weight, echoing and whispering in dizzying vacillation.  
  
The eddying turned into bubbling turned into churning darkness, and as the murk seethed, Castiel felt a _tugging_ inside him, in the deepest place, his most secret self. It was the kernel of consciousness, anchoring him; it was the place from which the ties that bound him in life to those he called kin sprouted and grew. Closing his eyes, going within, he turned his attention to the pull.  
  
With his thoughts thus occupied, Castiel noticed the change in pressure around him: a silencing, abrupt, as though every tormented creature inside the Empty had suddenly become mute, or vanished from existence entirely. All that remained when Castiel opened his eyes was the disturbing roil of the oil-slick ground beneath his feet and the vanishing whispers of what sounded like his name.  
  
Nothingness stretched in every direction. Castiel turned a slow circle, listening, feeling the pull like the sweet ache he had come to live with tucked cozy beneath his ribs.  
  
_Cas…_

He turned again but was met with more nothing; this time, however, Castiel was certain he heard his name. Prayer was not meant to reach him here. _Nothing_ was meant to reach him in this oblivion. He knew these echoes were merely reflections, imitations, pale spirits where once there was living flesh. It was the darkness and the Empty and the all-too-sudden absence of sound playing tricks on him.  
  
_…comin’ to get you, Cas…_  
  
Closing his eyes, Castiel let the susurration of Dean’s voice wash over him. He clung even more desperately to the happiness that brought him here, certain that once he lost his grip on it, the torment of eons would come crashing down on him like a tidal wave.  
  
_…just hang on…_

**~~~**

He knows what it is like to be a grain of sand on a beach, warming and waiting in the sun for the touch of cool ocean waves. To be forever trapped, confined, eternally suspended in the impatient agony of _wanting,_ receiving the union you crave only to have it snatched away again, over and over and over, no matter how hard you clench your fists, or scream to the heavens for this pain to cease.  
  
But he also knows, now, the unadulterated joy of that same grain of sand, washed over and tumbled about, surrounded, however briefly, by the thing it loves most, knowing the ocean is a constant and its return is guaranteed. Simply existing in such a space, moving through the cycle, _is_ the joy. Not the anticipation of what could be, but the celebration of what _is_.

And this celebration lifts him up and away from the longing, it pushes under ebony wings, a holy benediction, and thrusts him into exultation.

**~~~**

Overhead, a sound like shattering glass crashed into Castiel’s awareness, something strangely tangible in the evanescent expanse of the Empty, substantial in a way nothing else was or felt.  
  
Castiel raised his eyes to where he heard this impossible sound, astonished and uneasy as he watched bright lines of red light splinter and spiderweb through the air around him in a dome of red lightning. A deep, vibrating groan rumbled through his feet, agitating the bubbling surface beneath him. He felt pinned, every edge of him, sharp and soft alike, held firm as the vibrations and the accompanying sound grew in intensity. Red light zig-zagged madly through the darkness, until finally, with the unexpected _pop_ of pressure releasing, the dome above cracked and shattered, splintering into thousands of shards of inky gloom and raining onto Castiel’s head like a stinging storm.

Brushing glittering obsidian slivers from his shoulders, Castiel glanced at his feet and watched as a glowing red line materialized out of the nothingness and stretched off, sinuous, into nowhere.  
  
He felt it again, then, a plucking of some connective string inside him, resonating within him like a song.  
  
Knowing it was more than likely this was something intended to trick him, Castiel took hold of the string, set his foot on the red line, and started walking.

**~~~**

The fact of the matter was: even before he had laid eyes on Dean Winchester’s soul, he had felt its pull somewhere beyond his understanding of himself. A moth never questioned why it flew to the flame. It only knew it had to go, as Castiel knew, he _understood_ , he had to go to Dean.  
  
He saw right away how beautiful Dean was. Broken and bleeding and ashamed, and beautiful nonetheless. Though he knew it was forbidden by his Heavenly Father and all the laws of creation, from the very first moment, loving Dean Winchester was, for Castiel, inevitable.  
  
Time and again, through meetings, and partings, and meeting again, Castiel came to realize not only was his love for Dean inexorable, it was _whole_ and _utter_ in a way his love for his Father never was.

Choosing him, again and again and _again_ , was… liberating. He remade his purpose; he pulled free of his Heavenly Father’s orbit, and _loved_ this one imperfect, impatient, _impossible_ human being, more than he loved anything in the entirety of his Father’s dominion. And in doing so, became the only agent of free will in the entirety of his Father’s dominion.

That he, unshakeable and antediluvian, was capable of such transmutation as this: overcoming his divine purpose to serve Heaven, and protect humanity, and obey God, he – unshackled and open-eyed – instead chose to serve himself, protect his love, and obey his heart. It was the most radical act of self-love he could have bestowed upon himself, listening to the secrets buried deep inside him, written into every mote of his being.  
  
So it was with no small measure of aggravation that the longer he followed the glowing path beneath his feet, the more Castiel realized there was a familiar quality to this sensation, of walking through labyrinthine corridors hung with shadows and yet knowing precisely which turns to take; he was called, compelled, and he chose to answer this call, moving towards it with purpose, that purpose being to finally shake some sense into Dean Winchester’s thick skull.  
  
Couldn’t Dean simply… let Castiel give him this one thing? The only thing Castiel ever truly had to give Dean in the first place, the only thing sad, well-intentioned Castiel had that wasn’t somehow polluted by his past misdeeds: his own life in exchange for a second chance, a tiny extra burst of time snatched surreptitiously out of God’s grasp for Dean to breathe and plan and act and _live_.  
  
The whispers, following along behind and around Castiel like wisps of smoke, gathered and built into a hissing crescendo, and the sleek glossy ground convulsed under him, black bubbles bursting, obscuring the glowing red path. He stumbled, stopped, catching himself upright before he could pitch over sideways from the unsteady footing. Ahead in the gloom, Castiel watched the cherry-colored line smolder away into nothing. It burnt like an ember in the blackness, flaring bright for a moment before it disappeared abruptly as though doused.  
  
Around him, the seething of the surface beneath his feet finally settled. It was, suddenly and unexpectedly, completely silent, the strange-yet-familiar background hiss falling away, muffled and then quelled like the whole of the Empty had been smothered. After an interminable amount of time with the steady stream of white noise, the silence felt infinitely more sinister. Castiel, wary, peered into the dark, searching in all directions, finding nothing until it occurred to him to look _down_.

The ground, now smooth and slick as ice, became a mirror, and for the briefest moment Castiel saw himself reflected there. But then his reflection shivered and melted away, revealing an image of Dean, upside-down at Castiel’s feet. As Castiel looked, so too did Dean. Their gazes met, crashing through the thin barrier of the ground between the soles of their shoes. Castiel let his awareness of their bond wash over him, and indeed it seemed they were simultaneously within reach of each other and vastly far apart, as though they were merely standing on opposite sides of a door, but the gap under the lintel was composed entirely of the vastness of space.

The bond cried out for communion, and Castiel had no idea how – or if – he could reach across the liminal space between them to give it peace.

Dean was looking at him – _seemed_ to be looking right into the heart of him – and calling to him. Castiel could see Dean’s mouth form his name but no sound accompanied the motion; as he watched, Dean became increasingly frantic, his face a thundercloud as he shouted silently for Castiel, who could only look on with a growing doubt in his mind.  
  
Was any of this even real?  
  
More likely, he thought, it was only the beginning of the rest of his eternity of suffering at the hands of the Empty: to be forever caught and caged, held on the precipice of rejoining that which he loved the most but never given the satisfaction of the leap. Or worse, forced to look on helplessly as Dean suffered through Castiel’s loss. Castiel wasn’t stupid. He knew saving Dean as he had was going to hurt him. But he’d be alive to feel hurt. He’d be alive to overcome it and move on.  
  
The reflection of Dean under his feet dropped to its knees, hands on the ground. He was still shouting, still without sound. Crouching, hoping for a better view, Castiel saw real panic in Dean’s eyes as the other man struck at the ground with a closed fist. He watched Dean sit back on his heels, the desperate glances he threw in all directions before resting his face in his hands. He watched as Dean’s shoulders lifted and fell before he set them, firm determination in their line.  
  
And he watched, stricken, as Dean calmly drew an angel blade from somewhere in his jacket, pressed the tip to his own heart, and drove the blade in to the hilt.  
  
In the suffocating silence of the Empty, his anguished cry of “No!” pushed back the invisible blanket stifling him, chasing its remnants into the distance and away.

Blood spilled, garish and brash, across the slick surface under Castiel’s feet, puddling and pooling, and he watched, impotent, as Dean’s face contorted in a rictus of pain. His teeth clenched and bloodied, he slid the blade free of his ribs and let it clatter soundlessly to the ground. Castiel collapsed all the way to his knees, mind blank and heart in agony, as he sat trapped, unable to look away from the most precious person in his entire universe bleeding to death in front of him.  
  
“This is not real,” he said aloud, though he wasn’t sure if he wanted to convince himself or let the Empty know he couldn’t be pushed around so easily.  
  
But the longer he looked, the more blood dribbled through Dean’s fingers as he clenched his hands futilely over the wound, the more Castiel’s stomach sank. “It’s not,” he whispered, caught between terror and hope, his insides churning. If it _was_ real –

Around him, the edges of the blood pooled around Dean started to bubble and smoke. Frowning, Castiel stood slowly, confused and aghast when tiny red droplets oozed through the ground and then fell upwards into darkness. Soon a gentle reverse rain danced around him, and as Castiel realized with a sick feeling that this _was_ happening, the ground buckled under him, pitching and rolling, sending him off balance.

Castiel tripped forward and was swallowed by inky night.

**~~~**

Gentle warmth touches the edges of Castiel’s awareness. There is… light. And… sound? Through the blood thrumming in his ears, he hears a muffled voice hard-edged with terror, loud and frantic and sounding a thousand miles away.  
  
_“Dean!”_

Castiel blinks and rolls his head toward the muted sound of Sam’s voice calling for his brother, sharp with panic, aiming to hold him away from the precipice of death. Colors and shapes float lazily across his vision before resolving into Sam, crouching over Dean, who is sprawled like a rag doll on the concrete. Sam’s got his hands over Dean’s heart, leans his full weight into it, looking between his brother and the open door, distraught. Castiel sees the blood staining Sam’s wrists and forearms and commands his body to cooperate, to sit up. The room spins. He collapses against the icy concrete floor, squeezes his eyes shut, swallows.  
  
Sam mutters something to himself, too quiet for Castiel to hear actual words. He is clearly talking to Dean, but it’s just as clear Dean is unconscious. Castiel prays, _begs_ that he is only unconscious.

_“Jack!”_ Sam shouts, turning towards the door again. _“I need you in here, Jack, please!”_

Castiel’s ears start to ring, a high-pitched whine drilling through his dampened hearing. Other sounds drift to the surface: the squeak-squeal of Jack’s sneaker soles on the linoleum of the hall, the distant, pervasive background hum of the bunker, Sam growling at Dean, “C’mon, Dean, don’t _do_ this!”

“Sam?”  
  
Castiel tips his head back and stares upside-down at Jack, seeming to fill the doorway but looking the same as ever, small frown creasing his brows.  
  
He takes in the room from the door, his eyes landing at last on Castiel and widening in surprise. “Castiel,” he says, warmth and wonder in his voice, “I didn’t expect to see you here.”  
  
“Jack–”

“I know, Sam,” Jack says, voice gentle as he crosses into the room and lays a hand on Sam’s shoulder. He, too, crouches beside Dean, reaching out to cover Sam’s hands, lifting them slowly away. He closes his eyes, stretches out his hand, and lays his palm over Dean’s heart. Buttery light spills out from under Jack’s fingers, soaking into Dean’s clothes. Castiel sees tendrils of glowing gold twist and twitch under Dean’s skin, flaring and receding with a steady pulse-pulse-pulse, and closes his eyes.  
  
Dean is safe, in good hands. Castiel lets himself slip away into the dark.

**~~~**

There’s a quiet, paper-dry whisper of book pages carefully turned.  
  
The steady, mechanical _tick-tick-tick_ of a clock.  
  
Occasionally, slurping and sighing, a mug clunking onto a wooden surface.  
  
Castiel opens his eyes.  
  
Disoriented, he stares at the grey ceiling with a frown, unable to recall how he’d come to be lying in an honest-to-goodness bed, with a fluffy pillow and a warm quilt and the rich aroma of coffee wafting through the air. He remembers a misting red rain and the sensation of falling into orbit. He remembers hearing sounds from what felt like a thousand miles underwater and the warm golden glow of healing light.  
  
He remembers.  
  
Turning his head to the side, Castiel is met with a most welcome sight – Dean Winchester, alive and breathing and very much asleep, chin to chest, a well-loved paperback copy of _Cat’s Cradle_ taking its time falling from his slack fingers. He can see a mug on the desk behind Dean, empty or cold with no steam rising from the top. For the moment, Castiel is happy simply to look his fill.  
  
Dean, dressed in his usual fashion, seems somehow infinitely more careworn than he was when Castiel saw him last, even in his sleep. His hair is peppered with grey, now, and there’s a long, angry red scar on his forearm running from the back of his left wrist to the crook of his elbow. His fingers twitch around the curled paper edges of his book, and he stirs, head snapping back, a sudden disgruntled sound escaping him. He fumbles the book to the floor and swears, automatic and under his breath, bending to retrieve it. He finally notices Castiel is awake when he wraps a hand around the book and returns to sitting upright.  
  
For an instant, Dean looks caught, eyes wide and mouth hanging open. His works his jaw soundlessly, and in the moment he takes to regain his footing, Castiel observes the lines around his eyes, the smattering of new freckles across the bridge of his nose, another scar, small and faint, bisecting his left eyebrow. Castiel curls his hands into fists atop the quilt, appalled at how strong the impulse is to reach out and touch and catalogue each new attribute, like merely the touch will commit the changes to memory. Like he _needs_ to commit them to memory. He’s here, now, for better or worse. Surely Dean wouldn’t have pulled Castiel out of the Empty only to turn him away. Surely, he has time to look and take inventory beyond this moment.  
  
The silence stretches between them for another beat before Dean visibly shakes himself. He swallows thickly and scrubs a hand through his hair, leaving his hand on the back of his neck as he says, “Hey, Cas.”  
  
“Hello, Dean,” Castiel replies, testing his weight on his arms and pushing himself awkwardly to sitting. His limbs feel impossibly heavy, and there’s a throbbing ache behind his eyes. He presses his fingers to the bridge of his nose, and when he looks back at Dean, he’s met with a worried pinch around the other man’s eyes.  
  
“Jesus,” Dean breathes. He twists in his seat, laying his book on the desk, before turning back to Castiel and leaning on his elbows. His hands hang between his knees, fingers tangling apart, together, apart, together. He clears his throat, wets his lip. Looks Castiel in the eye. “Sorry, uh. Been thinkin’ about this a lot, but I guess now that you’re here…” He steadies himself, moving fluidly from awkward to confident in a way that makes Castiel’s mouth feel suddenly dry. “Damn, it’s good to see you, Cas,” he finally finishes.  
  
“It is… excellent to see you as well, Dean,” Castiel says, feeling hope and wariness flare to life inside him. This… is not what Castiel had been expecting. No, he’d expected to spend the rest of eternity locked away from everyone and everything he’d come to love, alone with only his memories for company. If he’s honest with himself, Castiel had imagined Dean pulling him from the Empty, but the reasoning always hung heavy with the sense of obligation and Dean’s persistent inability to let go of anyone he’s perceived to have abandoned him.

Sitting here in the bunker, face-to-face with smiling eyes full of genuine _relief_ , turns Castiel’s feelings upside-down and twists his stomach inside-out and begs the question: why _did_ Dean come for him?  
  
Dean stands, abrupt, and takes a step towards the bed before he catches himself and stops mid-stride, fidgeting.  
  
“Hey,” he says, voice brittle and cracking. “Uh, look. You’ve been gone a long time. And maybe I’m not – shit. I’ll. I’m gonna go get Sammy, he can explain–”  
  
“How long?” Castiel interrupts.  
  
He can hear Dean swallow in the sudden silence. “Too long, man. Almost two years.”  
  
“I see.”  
  
The string stretched between his heart and Dean’s vibrates, intense and pure, imploring Castiel to make the space between them disappear. He reminds himself that the being – the _feeling_ – this feeling is enough.  
  
But Dean coming for him, that is… _so_ much closer to the _having_ , and Castiel doesn’t know if he can bear it.  
  
“It took us a while, y’know? To find the right spell. Jack wouldn’t help out. Kid’s got this whole Do-Not-Interfere thing going on,” Dean mutters grumpily. He pushes his hands into his pockets and rocks onto the balls of his feet. “Then it took another six months to find all the ingredients we needed. _Then_ we had to wait for the right moon phase, or whatever.”  
  
“Moon phase?” Castiel asks incredulously.  
  
“It was actually a lot more complicated than that,” Sam’s voice suddenly says from the doorway. “We needed a particular planetary alignment, not to mention waiting for the barrier between Earth and the Empty to thin out a little.” Sam speaks plainly, as though it wasn’t an enormous achievement to open a door into a place never meant to be touched from this plane of existence, never mind figure out a way to bring _something_ back from what was, essentially, _nothing_.

Castiel is simultaneously befuddled and pleased as Sam comes into the room with a fresh mug of coffee in one hand and a giant smile on his face. Handing the mug off to his brother, he strides to Castiel’s bedside and slaps a giant hand on his shoulder. “Welcome back, Cas,” he says warmly, eyes bright. He nods towards Dean, who stands statue-still in the middle of the room, mug in hand and face cycling through several expressions. When Sam says, “Maybe now Dean’ll quit whining all the time,” though, he lands firmly on his Ready For Nuclear War With His Little Brother face.  
  
Castiel raises his eyebrows and Sam laughs when he sees Dean’s look. Shaking his head, his long legs carry him back out in the hall. “I’ll leave you two to it,” he calls over his shoulder, disappearing as immediately as he came.  
  
Castiel frowns at Dean, who looks intently into his mug of coffee, thoughtful, before raising it to his mouth and taking a deep drink. Castiel gets the impression that Dean is wishing for something stronger than coffee.

“If Jack is not interfering, as you say,” Castiel muses when Dean looks at him again, “then how… how are you here? Alive?”  
  
Dean’s eyes flash with surprise before he regains a more neutral expression. “What do you mean?” he asks carefully.  
  
“You were dead, Dean. I watched you kill yourself.”  
  
“Ah,” Dean says. His boots are suddenly fascinating to him. “I wasn’t sure– I didn’t know if you could see me,” he mutters. “In the Empty, I mean. I could see you, under the ground. But it was like you were frozen. You didn’t react to anything I– you didn’t react.”  
  
As he has come more fully awake, Castiel remembers more and more details. He remembers looking through the twisted mirror at his feet and seeing Dean reflected back at him. He frowns.  
  
“I saw you,” he says, slow, thinking of other more unwelcome details as they resurface. The look of panic and – and maybe _heartbreak_ – on Dean’s face, for one. “What kind of spell requires the caster to stab themself in the heart?”  
  
For some reason this question makes Dean flush to his hairline. He coughs, shakes himself, and crosses to the foot of Castiel’s bed. He doesn’t sit and Castiel doesn’t ask him to. They stare at each other, quiet and intense, until Dean blinks and looks away.  
  
“So, uh,” he starts, awkward. “It wasn’t… necessarily… a _requirement_ …?”  
  
Castiel narrows his eyes.  
  
“It had to be, um. Somethin’ really important. To you, y’know? Somethin’ that would hurt you bad if you lost it.  
  
“I thought – I dunno, I thought me givin’ up on what you sacrificed yourself for would fuck you up the most.” He grinned sheepishly. “Kinda bratty, I know.”  
  
“Extremely,” Castiel deadpans, and Dean huffs a laugh.  
  
They fall silent again. Carefully, Castiel draws his legs in and sits cross-legged under the quilt. “Did Sam know what you were planning?” he asks quietly.

Dean shifts on his feet and looks away, which is answer enough. Castiel looks at him levelly and can’t quite stop himself from saying, “And here you were always the one telling _me_ not to do anything stupid.”  
  
As soon as the words pass his lips Castiel wishes he could take them back. On Earth and conscious for only minutes, he has no intention of fighting with Dean or making him angry, and yet it seems he is unable to hold back the thoughts that, under normal circumstances, would rile the other man the most. But to his surprise, his assertion seems only to amuse Dean. A small, melancholy sort of smile crosses his face, and he finally decides to sit. His weight creates a tiny divot in the mattress, gravity grabbing at Castiel, too, and tipping him in Dean’s direction.  
  
“Yeah, well. Stupid was kinda all I had left,” Dean mutters to his coffee mug.

“And what would you have done if this scheme of yours didn’t work? If Sam wasn’t there in time? If Jack hadn’t decided to interfere?” Castiel demands, suddenly furious with Dean for making light of yet _another_ near-escape from death. It makes the headache beating against the inside of his skull throb even more vigorously.

“Nothing, obviously,” Dean fires back. He lifts his shoulders in a helpless shrug and goes quiet, chewing on his bottom lip for a long time. His eyes flick to Castiel’s and then away. He shrugs again, gaze keen on his hands wrapped around the chipped porcelain mug. Voice low and raw, _vulnerable_ , he admits, “I figured, if it didn’t work, then I wouldn’t have to live without you anymore, man.”  
  
Shaken, Castiel expels all the breath in his lungs in a rush. Dean tenses, relaxes, and finally meets his eyes.  
  
“I was a mess, Cas,” he tells him, eyes flickering with the ghost of grief. “After you– I mean, we took care of Chuck, but once it was all over?” He shakes his head. “Sammy and Eileen spent a good four or five months making sure I didn’t spend the rest of my life at the bottom of a bottle.”  
  
“Eileen?” Castiel asks, confused.  
  
“Yeah,” Dean tells him. “She’s around here somewhere. Lives here now.” He lets out a slow breath and continues, “Once Chuck was out of the picture, Jack– well, he sort of reset… everything. Brought everyone back like that Rapture shit never happened.”  
  
“Everyone but me,” Castiel observes.  
  
Dean looks at him from the side of his eye. “Well, yeah. Said he couldn’t get involved with the Empty, but _we_ could.” Shifting uncomfortably, Dean mumbles, “He also might have said– uh, something about it meaning– meaning more if _I_ was the one to come get you, so.” He shrugs again, diffusing a nervous energy.  
  
“Look, Cas,” Dean says, leaning forward and placing his coffee carefully on the floor. He turns to face Castiel, expression tense and serious but somehow unburdened. “There’s a lot – a _lot_ – we gotta talk about. But I gotta make something clear to you, first.”  
  
Castiel watches, astonished, as Dean reaches across the bed and touches his fingers to the backs of Castiel’s. It’s a barely-there thing, the lightest pressure, but Castiel can feel the touch all the way to his toes, his whole body thrumming with a rarer and perhaps more precious happiness: the joy of coming together again, a unified whole.  
  
When he doesn’t pull away, only sits frozen in surprise, Dean’s touch becomes firmer. He slides the tips of his fingers over Castiel’s hand and carefully curls them around, brushing tender against his palm before gripping Castiel tight. Dean stares at their hands, joined on the bed, and swallows so thickly Castiel can hear it in the quiet bedroom.  
  
“I want this,” Dean says, tone sure and voice steady. He raises his eyes to Castiel’s. “I want _you_. Got it? You’ve got me.”  
  
“Just– just like that?” Castiel manages to stammer.  
  
“Yeah, Cas,” Dean says with a smile. This one is soft, bending his plush mouth into a bow, unshakeable and full of promise. “Just like that.”

**end.**

**Author's Note:**

> Come find me on [tumblr](https://aishitara.tumblr.com/). I'm not super active there but my blog is pretty much 99.9999% Destiel trash (there's some johnlock thrown in there for good measure, I think).
> 
> Also, if you love screaming about SPN and deancas in particular (and are over 18), consider joining us on the [PB Discord server.](https://discord.gg/profoundbond) Hella fun and a community of very sweet, wonderful, like-minded people!


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